Well, at least it’s not clashing with I’m A Celeb. If I’m A Celeb was going to be on. I’ve just discovered that the ITV2 showing of Killer Camp series two over the next fortnight has been given the much-sought after 10:45pm slot on Monday, and 11pm the rest of the week.

The first series was a combination of really fun and ideas I would politely describe as “bullshit”.

This was one of those very frustrating shows where you can see the potential, and occasionally it shines through (agreed that Bobby Mair was great in this, and I did think the ending was quite something), but they made so many poor decisions in some areas I just want to find out what made them do the things they do…

I’d be really happy for it to get a (simpler, better thought out) second series, but if it doesn’t happen then I’ll live.

Me in 2019

This has quite an interesting history, the first series repeated well on The CW in the US to the point that this probably-more-US-centric second series got commissioned (which is kind of how Penn and Teller: Fool Us became a regular hit over there), but this second one flopped massively, pulled after two episodes.

Turns out there are likely to be two murderers this time round as well – US and UK schedulers.

From 7:15pm (UK) / 8:15pm (Europe)
On the Bother’s Bar Discord

That’s right! We’re no longer bothering to stream them to Youtube because a) only about three people watched and b) we can sort out some “naughty” streaming solution on the Discord, so why not join us for many hours of casual watchalong fun this evening as two celebs battle it out for Elton’s €100,000 briefcase across fifteen mystery events that we’ll try and work out as the evening progresses.

There’s usually some extra-curricular quizzing and gossip throughout the night as well, feel free to put yourself on mute if you just want our background chatter. This episode it’s razor wit AND high glamour as Katja Burkard takes on drag artist Olivia Jones. Let’s hope the games don’t, heh, drag on eh?

We’ll be on likely until around midnight, so do come and join us.

Cut and Thrust, purveyors of excellent TV theme tune mixes on Youtube, have just knocked it out of the park with their latest.

First! It’s Schlag den Star on Saturday! Come join us for fun, games and shenanigans in the Bother’s Bar Discord from 7:15pm UK.

Next apropos of nothing, it’s the full theme from Connections! Connections with Sue Robbie is of course the best afternoon quiz of the 80s, don’t bother at-ting me Blockbusters and Going for Gold fans. Banger alert!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bDhBkFsUUQU

Nexter! It’s only episode two of TV Show and Tell, with special guest Tom Blakeson and exciting plumbing!

Nextest! Some Christmas details have been released, top of the shop is The Weakest Link where eight celebs with connections to Christmas will battle it out to win up to £50k for charity and try not to get eliminated before Gemma Collins. Nice casualwear Romesh!

The Wall vs Celebrities, the show that everyone is just going to call Celebrity The Wall, is introducing The Superdrop! They’ve done this for a while in the US, basically it’s a drop with seven green balls, then a drop with seven red ones, for apparently no real reason other than to add more randomness tension.

Finally, The Sun is reporting that the BBC want to revive Friends Like These with Vernon Kay and Queen Alison Hammond, although why Hammond couldn’t host on her own I don’t know.

Gang I’m going to come out and say it: I know it was an unexpected episode, but the results this time round are a bit disappointing. Last time we managed to piss-off a producer. THIS IS THE SORT OF JUICE WE WANT.

Let’s see the best of what you did tell us:

• Race around the world is starting filming in January. With added Covid restriction-jeopardy thrown in.

This might have been good JUICE had I not read it on Twitter about twenty minutes before Taskmaster started so bad luck. I still think this feels a bit hopeful, as much as I’d like it to happen.

• I’ve won £1000 on a gameshow……. But it doesn’t get paid until it airs…………. In the middle of 2022

Actually fairly unusual for a UK production as I understand it, so I understand a level of aggravation.

• Netflix has bought the rights to The Mole for all territories except Belgium, Netherlands and Germany (they were still trying to sell the second season of the remake when the rights were negotiated). Someone from the production company told me. It’s not really news, but it is a more definitive version of our guesses.

Yay! The Mole made for a worldwide audience by Americans basically. That’ll definitely be good *looks to camera*.

• The social media detectives have perhaps found out two of the contestants for taskmaster s13. Chris Ramsey, his podcast lined up with the dates of the studio recordings, and Judi Love, she posted a picture in the same dressing room as Desiree did when they were doing the studio recordings, the picture got taken down

Chris Ramsey wasn’t on a list that was floating about I saw IIRC, would certainly add a bit more star value to the list I DID see (although I know and accept that it’s not always the big names that provide the big laughs). Anyway we’ll hopefully all find out next week after the final.

• True Stories is a show coming up. Four people, all with an unbelievable story, only one telling the truth. All interrogated by criminal interrogators. A fifth player has to guess who is telling the truth to win the cash. Get it wrong and the chosen liar wins.

Think I heard vague rumblings about this, or at least a contestant call-out for something that sounded like it. Not really a new idea, it’s Tell the Truth/Liar/Pants On Fire whatever, but the professional criminal interrogators might be an interesting twist.

• Total speculation, rather than inside info, but there has been so much crossover between the global Taskmaster Cinematic Universe and the Escape This Podcast, er, podcast that I am convinced that Alex Horne and chums are trying to work out a way to pitch something like it commercially. If the success of Outsiders shows there is a market for “Taskmaster but outdoors”, there could just as easily be a market for “Taskmaster but puzzly”.

I’m not sure how successful Outsiders is looking at the numbers (started at 500k, now around 200k. Is that enough? More people watched the last episode on catch-up than same day. I don’t know what would make Dave happy). Comedians doing escape rooms sounds like a winner on paper, but nobody’s really managed to turn the idea into a workable TV show yet. The much missed Race to Escape is probably the best try at it, but even that only did one series. Would an escape room TV show use up too many ideas too quickly? I have to say I hadn’t heard of the Escape This Podcast podcast, but looking it up if I wasn’t currently overwhelmed with podcasts I’d certainly give it a try.

• It’s not very interesting, but I’ve seen large photos of the new Weakest Link set and it’s very shiny. Recorded in Glasgow recently (at the same time as COP, inconveniently).

Yep I’ve seen some as well – looks a bit like the US one but with prettier podiums than the US one. Let’s hope the format is a bit prettier than the US one as well, eh? I actually thought they were going to film this with an audience, but apparently not. Still, though.

There we go, maybe not that bad after all. I think the next big Happening is GamesMaster “dropping” on Youtube on Sunday before a broadcast on E4 on Wednesday, I’ll put up a Show Discussion post for that.